


You Are Coming Down With Me (Hand in Unlovable Hand)

by Cloudbat



Category: Warriors - Erin Hunter
Genre: Other
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-07-06
Updated: 2018-10-25
Packaged: 2019-06-06 10:25:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 3,797
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15192767
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cloudbat/pseuds/Cloudbat
Summary: VS is the main person to thank for the inspiration for this fic. They mentioned an AU, based off a tumblr post where Frostfur actually got angry at Bluestar over her treatment of Brightheart, where Bluestar was overthrown and I started wondering how that would work. This is what I came up with!





	1. Ours is the Fury (Yours is the Shame)

Frostfur sits in the oak tree, the one she was always told was where old Owlstar followed his namesake from. Its ancient branches have gouges from her claws, and she can’t enjoy the evening’s warmth because her fury, she thinks, is an excellent rival for the sun.

“I could lead her away.”

Goldenflower has come; Frostfur had smelled her but paid no mind. 

“To where? Cats would go looking.” She snaps, hating herself for this, but not as much as her former mentor.

_The word of the Clan leader is the warrior code._

A maxim she’s breathed since birth, suckled in the nursery along with Robinwing’s milk. She used to look up to Bluestar like she did Silverpelt; both seemed as beautiful and distant.

She used to envy Thrushpelt. It was clear Bluestar didn’t love him - Frostfur’s not sure she’s ever really loved anyone, except for Fireheart. She admired that when she was young and stupid, head in the clouds, envious of how nothing ever truly seemed to frazzle her cool-faced mentor.

At least Thrushpelt could could say Bluestar valued his lies enough to keep him close.

Goldenflower tilts her head, twines around Frostfur on the branch they share. It’s lucky Goldenflower’s not a great beauty, or she might get distracted, and now is no time for anything but plans.

“To twolegplace. I’m sure I could get one of them to capture her.” The golden tabby murmurs.

Casual as a greeting over fresh-kill. As if they weren’t discussing treason.

“That’s a last resort.” She grunts, even as she admires the willingness for the act. “We’d lose a lot of sympathy if we sent her the same way Pinestar went. The older warriors are probably still sore over it.”

“Would you rather kill her? There’s no way of knowing how many lives she really has left; I rather doubt Cinderpelt would tell you. She’s hardly going to want even more of Bluestar’s ire.”

Her amber eyes glint with a dare as she speaks her retort, but to the white cat’s surprise, no reproach is in them either.

She wonders if the other queen hates her because her daughter lived - all her children live - while her sons died.

If she does, and she still agreed to meet her to try to overthrow the leader responsible for his death…she can work with that kind of hatred.

“No. I don’t think StarClan would approve. Fireheart would find out anyway, somehow; that tom doesn’t know when to stop.” She sighs.

Frostfur likes the ginger warrior; he’s not bad, for a kittypet, and he means well. He helped rescue her children from ShadowClan, and she doesn’t forget debts. 

One day she’ll repay him. Once this Clan is safe for her kits again.

“I think we’re going to have to put him into power; at least to pretend we’re not falling apart so the other Clans don’t try to take a go at us. Maybe we could use her as a hostage?”

“And keep her where?”

She scowls at the other queen, ears flicking, while Goldenflower stretches and blinks slowly at her.

“You have to think about these things. Thank goodness you told me what you were up to.”

“So you can think for me? Cute.” She drawls, tail flicking.

“Someone has to, my lovely snowflake.”

“Careful, my claws might slip.”

Goldenflower weaves around Frostfur, close enough to make her whiskers twitch nervously if she was a younger cat. 

“Not when you need me, Frostfur.” She whispers, breath warm in her companion’s ear. “You can’t do this alone. Save your venom for our beloved leader.”

She sniffs, annoyed at her for being right. 

“We’ll need at least half the Clan on our side.”

“All of them, dearheart. How else will we cover when we go to Gatherings? Would you try to silence them otherwise? Our own Clanmates are just trying to look out for themselves.”

She hisses softly, but Goldenflower keeps being right, and irritating as a thorn in her paw.

“We don’t say anything until we have a plan.” She finally says.

“A good plan.”

“We force Bluestar to retire.”

Goldenflower looks confused for a heartbeat, and Frostfur savors it, tucking the memory away. She reasserts herself, skepticism clear in her ears and body, but she's sitting tall and straight as the oak tree now.

“We talk to the other queens; to the whole Clan, make them see that she’s ruining us. We’ll be careful at first, then when we bring them around, that’s when we’ll all stand against Bluestar together. She can’t be a leader if she has no one to follow her.”

“That’s almost clever.” says Goldenflower, teasing her with an exaggerated yawn.

She swats at her shoulder. 

“I’m not hearing anything better.”

She looks at the other she-cat, and briefly, her facade is shucked like a nut loses its shell and there is no teasing air, no soft, clever words. Goldenflower’s gaze is a well of raw, angry grief that causes all Frostfur’s spine fur to stand on end.

“Better is gone. What I want to hear - what this Clan needs - is a reckoning.”

Frostfur nods.

All children die needlessly. There can be no rightness in the wake of such a thing.

They'll have to settle for destroying the madness that led to it.


	2. Your Heart (Is Now Washed Up In Bleach)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Two white cats struggle with their feelings.

Whitestorm’s out on patrol for part of the day, but he comes back and - oh, foxdung, he’s visiting Brightpaw. 

Frostfur hesitates outside of the medicine den, at the edge of its fern tunnel, whiskers twitching. This is her daughter, and she needs to talk to him…but does she have a right to intrude? The bond between a mentor and their apprentice is precious. Not to be disrespected, even by her.

Bluestar’s face flashes in her mind, the moment when that cold voice gave her daughter an unforgivable name. 

She walks through the tunnel, face set grimly. 

Whitestorm’s ears flick with surprise, but the big white tom doesn’t seem upset to see her. Yet he’s Bluestar’s nephew, and the old she-cat nearly tore him from his father’s paws after his mother’s death. Out of love? Out of spite? With her old mentor, the two could be hard to distinguish.

Unease creeps into her heart.

Brightpaw shifts, blinking at her out of her unruined eye.

“Mom?”

She wants to lick her daughter’s fur, curl around her, tell her everything will be all right. None of which would help her cause.

“Hi, sweetheart.” She says gently. “How are you?”

A stupid question, but there’s no other way to ask.

Brightpaw shudders. 

“How do I look, mom?” She croaks, with an edge of helpless wry humor to it. It’s not her face that bothers Frostfur; scars aren’t something any cat can help. She’s so proud of her daughter, proud enough that she feels it must be radiating off of her like light. She rubs against her, and licks her face, the bravest face she’s ever seen. Brightpaw doesn’t purr, but she nuzzles her back the tiniest bit before she pulls away.

The queen looks at Whitestorm, and dips her head in apology.

“I’m sorry, I…”

What is she even apologizing for? 

He rubs against her cheek, reassuring, strong.

“We were almost done talking, nothing to fret over.” He says, his voice deep and steady. She remembers growing up in the nursery with him and her sister, avoiding Goosefeather, teasing the apprentices.

She has to try. 

“Whitestorm, we got put on the next patrol together, I’d like to discuss where we’re going to hunt.”

He nods, and she has no idea if she believes her or not, but he follows her out of the cracked stone, through the fern tunnel, and doesn’t say a word until they’re several tree-lengths’ walk into the territory, in a place Frostfur knows few patrols ever go.

She can’t keep returning to the owl tree all the time; someone might notice, and the thought of a cat besides Goldenflower there prickles her fur with some sensation she can’t identify.

“My daughter is lying in the medicine den with terrible wounds, being cared for by her sister, and it’s not because of dogs.” 

Whitestorm sits as she speaks, his yellow gaze patient.

Frostfur pauses, gathering her confidence, and presses on.

“Bluestar led to this. I thought I knew her - StarClan’s sake, I was her first apprentice - but I don’t know a cat who calls my daughter _Lostface.”_

She spits the name like it’s a vile thing that crawled into her mouth, an insect that’s fed on nothing but rotten meat.

A bird calls - a robin, she thinks - and a breeze ruffles their pale pelts, stirring up the leaf litter on the forest floor.

“Do you want to see if she’ll change her mind? We can talk to her.”

A pang of guilt shreds her heart.

“Whitestorm…do you really think she can be reasoned with right now? She hates the whole Clan right now, except for Fireheart and Cloudtail. She’s paranoid, and I don’t know what’s going to happen to us.”

If she emphasizes the fear and sorrow into her voice, is that so wrong?

The large tom finally looks troubled, his tufted ears flicking as his tail slowly waves back and forth.

“What do you want to do, Frostfur?”

She takes a deep breath and lowers her voice. Even in this patch of territory, where hunting is slim and few patrols ever go, she can’t be too careful.

“I want to recommend that she retire. She’s given us seasons of leadership, laying down her lives for the Clan, and now…she’s miserable, and she’s causing misery because of it. Your apprentice should be a real warrior. Don’t you want to see her get a proper ceremony?”

She can see the conflict in his tormented eyes, in the hunch of his shoulders. Most cats would give him a moment, but the queen can’t afford that.

“She deserves a proper ceremony, and a proper name. Imagine if Cinderpelt had been treated like that after she got hit by a monster! Would that have been right?”

A flock of sparrows takes flight and the blue-eyed she-cat realizes too late that she’s gotten too loud and lowers her head.

“Please, Whitestorm…I need your help.”

The warrior sighs. 

“Do you know what you’re asking me, Frostfur?”

She looks away.

“Bluestar wasn’t my mother, but she might as well have been. I only remember scraps of Snowfur, fleeting memories. She raised me; she helped train me even while she was training you. I know this can’t be easy for you, but please realize what this is going to cost me.”

Terror and hope battle each other for dominance in the white she-cat’s heart.

“You’ll help me?” She asks, her voice once again a whisper.

“For the sake of my Clan. For Brightpaw. For Swiftpaw, may StarClan honor him.”

“Thank you.” She says, humbled outwardly, but inwardly yowling with triumph.


	3. The Complications (You Could Do Without)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mourning can be a messy process.

The pale brown tabby is sitting at the base of Snakerocks, staring into the distance as if he can see answers in the moonlit patches between the shadows of the softly rustling trees.

He smells Goldenflower before she approaches, but his tail only twitches despondently. Longtail has known anger, disappointment, frustration, and resentment, but this emptiness is new and horribly unwelcome, there to smother his spirits at every turn no matter how he tries to flee.

“It was a cloudy day.”

Goldenflower sits next to him, her amber eyes locked on his own when he twists to face her, ears folded back.

“What?” He asks, confused, trying to keep an edge of annoyance out of his voice. Is it so hard to tell he wants to be left alone?

The striped she-cat doesn’t look nearly as ragged as he feels. He hates her for a moment, for handling this so much better than he is.

His insides surge with guilt at the thought, hot and terrible.

“You’d never had an apprentice before. You thought it was long overdue you got one, and I’d agreed with Bluestar that you were the best choice. He was so nervous before the ceremony that he nearly chattered my ears off, wondering how you would treat him, praying he would impress you.”

Longtail’s claws sink into the dirt, and Goldenflower can see how hard he’s trying not to shake, his fur still partially standing on end.

“You cared for my son well.” She whispers, and it’s strange how words so soft can put a cold shard of fear in the tabby’s heart.

“Still, you couldn’t save him.”

His whole body is cold, colder than the leaf-bare wind, and breathing is hard. His lungs can’t seem to fill up.

“It was Fireheart’s fault.” He snaps, tail lashing. “If he’d managed to - if Bluestar hadn’t - “

The queen’s calm gaze maddens him.

“ _I didn’t kill him!_ ” His voice has risen to a yowl, mournful and angry at the same time, frightening some prey animal in the nearby bushes as they rustle from its rapid retreat.

“We all killed him.”

The warrior can only gape at her in shock.

“Swiftpaw died because ThunderClan failed him. Bluestar most of all; she might as well have snapped his neck herself, left his body so torn we barely had anything to bury.”

Longtail shudders as he sees Goldenflower’s calmness is only a front; she is a mirror of his own guilt, stark as a reflection in a frozen stream.

“He didn’t come to you. He didn’t come to me, or Fireheart, or anyone else. He went only to Brightpaw, and she told my poor, stupid son what he wanted to hear.”

Numbly, Longtail swallows. He tries to find his voice.

“You shouldn’t speak of your son that way, Goldenflower.”

“Why not?” Her voice’s evenness now has a sharp edge to it, enough that the warrior flinches.

“He flung himself into a pack of dogs to die, and mangled Brightpaw with him. He may walk in StarClan, but his recklessness killed him, took his true, breathing body from me forever. We all killed Swiftpaw, but he led himself to slaughter, and _I cannot forgive him for it._ ”

She pauses, and her voice retracts its claws, though he can still feel them, sheathed under her words.

“Not yet.”

“Why are you telling me this?” He croaks, weak in the wake of the she-cat’s visceral emotion.

She leans close to him, nearly touching noses.

“You’re going to help me take down Bluestar, Longtail. You’re going to stand behind me when all of ThunderClan unites to make her retire, strips her of her name, and sends her away from Highrock forever.”

He almost asks why, but it’s automatic, and he quickly shuts his mouth, nodding. 

No, Longtail has no qualms with making his leader retire. Fireheart’s a poor replacement, but he’s not insane. He at least agreed that Swiftpaw should be a warrior.

“When will this happen?”

“In time, Longtail. Speak nothing of it for now.”

The warrior nods. He’d thought he was done with secrets when Tigerclaw left.

Now he has one worth keeping.


	4. We Are Greater in Soul (Than Our Immeasurable Ghosts)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Being in a Clan means you lose a lot of family.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My longest chapter yet! There was a huge gap between the last one and this one because I jump around projects, it's what I do. I hope it was worth the wait. I do have the outline for chapter five, but I have no idea when it'll get written. Just know I'm still steadily plotting!

One-eye sighs as she stretches in the not-yet-warm dawn, lamenting the stiffness of her body, the cold that creeps under her pelt and can so rarely be driven away for long.

Age was insidious. The bitter truth of every cat’s life, even as they pretended it would never happen. Sometimes she wondered if she shouldn’t have fallen in battle.

Her hearing isn’t what it used to be, but she smells the approach of Frostfur and Goldenflower in enough time to ease herself to a standing position, sniffing to see if they’ve got an apprentice with them, checking her for ticks.

The apprentices to do that lately have been few, she recalls with a pang. Poor Swiftpaw and Brightpaw. At least Runningwind had made it to warrior. At least he had served his Clan well for many moons until one of those hateful monsters had sent him to the ancestors.

A mother should not have to witness her son’s death. It was as unnatural as a fish trying to fly. 

Warriors fell all the time to sickness, to war, to accident - but there was an order to things, a meaning to the sequence of generations. Of course, there would always be upsets and inconsistencies…

Lately the whole Clan felt like one.

“One-eye.” Frostfur’s voice reaches her from outside the tree trunk, loud enough so that she can hear it clearly. “May we speak with you?”

“You can certainly try.” She says, wry humor in her meow, the expectation that they had better have a good reason for visiting.

Never hurts to keep the young cats on their toes.

The queens pad in, seemingly at ease, but even though her remaining eye is failing her, One-eye can sense the tension in their walk, in the curve of their backs and in the set of their whiskers. 

“Since you’re both as stiff as a pair of dead ducks, I doubt you have good news for me.” She comments, though her cold nose finally smells and blearily makes out the fresh-kill Goldenflower is carrying.

The tabby drops it at her feet. One-eye raises an eyebrow. Warriors occasionally bring elders prey directly, but it’s not common, and it’s rarely with the trouble to bring it all the way to their den. 

Even the apprentice shortage can’t explain away such behavior.

“One-eye.” says Frostfur, hesitant at the beginning, until a snort from the elderly she-cat hardens her voice. That was more like it. If they were going to tell her something risky, they ought to have confidence in themselves.

“We have important things to discuss.” She says, now intent and stern. “How do you feel about the state of ThunderClan? Do you not agree that something must change?”

“I agree that many things should change, but will they do so quickly, Frostfur? You are still young; we have weathered worse times than this, and Bluestar has led us through.”

“Have we?” challenged Goldenflower, and One-eye could hear the disgust in her voice as clearly as she’d once heard the wind in the trees.

“Have we ever had a leader go senile and neglect us all, cursing us for our faith, giving shameful names to our children?”

Frostfur must react in a way One-eye cannot discern, for she catches the edge of Goldenflower murmuring an apology.

The elder stiffly - carefully - bends down to take a few bites of the sparrow. All of its feathers have already been plucked for her ease; the queens want something badly.

“I don’t remember.” She says, a bit snappish, but she wants them to be honest, and she doesn’t quite trust Goldenflower. That molly was always a bit too clever for her own good. 

So she turns her single, clouded eye on the white blur of Frostfur.

“Does it matter if we have? Bluestar was anointed by StarClan. Whether she still believes or not, she was given nine lives, and her word is our code. I am not trying to diminish your pain - they were a terrible tragedy, and I know what it is to lose a son - ”

 _“Your_ son got to live as a warrior! Bluestar never denied him his ceremony!”

Goldenflower cries out like a cat cornered by twolegs, a wail of rage and suffering that might cow a lesser cat. Instead One-eye hisses, ready to spit a retort, but again she just barely makes out the soft voice of Frostfur and sees her press against the bereaved mother.

Ears flattened, she takes a few deep breaths and allows her fur to lie flat before she speaks again.

“Your pain must be allowed time to heal.” She says, softer, but firm. “Do not torment yourself trying to have a paw in the order of the Clan. You will make things worse, and extend your suffering.”

“She’s already lost most cats.” says Frostfur simply. Can Goldenflower not speak for herself? One-eye wonders crossly.

Then she realizes the tabby’s head is held low, her eyes hidden, unnaturally still. Is it pain she hides, or rage? 

Sometimes the line is as thin as a whisker.

“Would you want to die feeling you had left something undone, One-eye?”

“That’s the lot of most cats.” She grunts. “Only the very lucky have no regrets or unfinished business before StarClan calls us away.”

“Swiftpaw never had the time to have any regrets but one.”

One-eye’s tail lashes. She would like to be fully deaf, to shut out the carefully pitched words made to creep into her gray ears, nicked from seasons of battle, once sharp enough to hear the mice scavenge for food.

Once keen enough to hear the chatter and laughter of her Clan, instead of the heavy silence that now hangs over the camp. Losing her denmates was bad enough. A cat can feel warmth, likes to smell her companions even if she struggles to understand them they don’t speak directly to her.

A cat can mourn her mate, and her son, and wonder why the fire and its wretched smoke didn’t claim her too.

Goldenflower isn’t special for her loss. Nor is Frostfur; One-eye’s own mate lost part of his tail to a badger.

What would Halftail say, if he were here? What would Runningwind?

Her son had never been the mentoring type. Halftail, when he’d been Sparrowpelt, had loved it. She remembered his shock and hurt when Snowfur had been killed, remembered his numbness when Redtail had suffered his own terrible fate, one later revealed to be steeped in treason.

She breathed deeply.

“Goldenflower.” She says. “Do you believe Tigerstar will try to hurt us further?”

The bronze she-cat mutters something the elder can’t make out, to which she gives a pointed glare.

“Yes.” She says, loud enough for the elder to hear. “Yes, he will keep trying to destroy us until either he is dead or we are ruined. I loved him; I thought I knew him. I should have killed him when I had the chance.”

One-eye can see the blur of Frostfur bristle in shock, as Goldenflower holds her head high, betraying no doubt or hesitation in her words.

“We cannot afford to be weak when he returns. We must talk Bluestar down, and let Fireheart take her place. He is too young, he is a kittypet, he is naive in politics. But he believed my son should have been a warrior. He spoke up when Brightpaw was shamed for surviving what my son did not.”

The pale gray molly bows her own head, heavy with the weight of moons and sorrow.

“I will help you, with one condition.”

The two she-cats look at each other, then back at her. Frostfur speaks.

“Name it.”

“We will go to the Moonstone and seek StarClan’s counsel. We must speak with Swiftpaw ourselves.”


End file.
